Hello, friends and countrymen and all that jazz.
Emma isn’t feeling super right now, but she does feel that she
owes her adoring public some content, so I thought I would take a crack at the old
typing machine.
We just got back from Thailand this week, and it was a
blast. A very hot, wet… trip.
Poor word choices aside, I did learn a thing or two about
making rice that I thought I’d share with you fine people.
I don’t have good pictures of the first bits, but we did get
a lesson on the processing, so I have some pictures of that. Bear with me on
the stock photos.
Planting
Planting rice isn’t as easy as it sounds, turns out.
Actually, you’re going to hear that a lot this post.
So, in order to plant rice, you first need to drain the paddy
field of water, and till the land, and plant some seeds. Nowadays they use
motorized buffalo (tractors) for this work, but a few people still do it the
traditional way.
Credit: Kidcyber
This is what we in the business call a nursery field. Then,
the field is re-flooded, and allowed to simmer. You grow up the baby rice until
it’s about knee height, then time for replanting in a different flooded field.
They move the baby plants by hand to make sure they all get planted with enough
room to become big, healthy foody-type plants. Doesn’t look like fun to me, but
they probably wouldn’t like sitting all day at my desk either, so who am I to
judge?
Credit: Sacred Earth
After letting them get all big and seed-y, it’s time to
harvest. They told us you can get about 30 rice seeds from healthy, properly
planted rice plant. They look about like this when all done.
Credit: Connexion France’s
Now, we harvest. This can be done with an old-fashioned
hand-scythe, or with a modern tractor or combine, as finances allow. Your goal
in the end is to get it in bundles of about 25-30 shoots for the drying and
further processing.
Getting the tasty bit out
Now we have to get the rice grains out of the plant. This is
easier with dry plants than green ones (plus dry rice doesn’t go bad nearly as
fast), so we hang the bundles upside-down, or spread them out on a tarp to dry.
I didn’t catch how long this takes, but I’m betting it takes about a month from
my (very modest) research.
How to get the rice out now? Well, smack it, of course.
We wrap the bundle in a tool that has genuine rope-and-stick-technology,
and smack it upside-down on a tarp to get all the yummy carb goodness out. We
feed the other bits to the cows and goats and such, which will go with the rice
at a later date, but for the sake of time, I’ll leave that bit out here.
So, there’s this pile of seeds wrapped in very tough,
fibrous husks on our tarp. Still not very yummy. Time for more smacking!
Credit: Emma’s joy at
something she’s allowed to stomp on, for science
We’re going to leap forward from our previous technology to
the lever! A big long one, with a bin and hammer at one end, resembling a giant
mortar and pestle. Pour the rice in and smash smash smash. This will hopefully get
the husk off without smashing all the tasty rice, but I’m betting there’s an
art to that, which I haven’t mastered yet. What I ended up with looked more
like tapioca, but I’m not in the pro-league just yet.
Now, assuming someone who knows what there doing is
involved, we have a pile of mixed rice grain and husks. No, we’re not going to smack
them again just yet. Give them some time to recover!
Time for some swishing. I am an expert swisher, but the kind
farm person showing us her technique was a bit more efficient than me. The idea
is that now the husk is lighter and has more surface area than the grain, so
with some good swishing, you can get the husks up and out of the basket-lid-thingy
and keep the grains inside. For as-yet unhusked rice, which may be still
present in the pile, it’s back to the smashing.
Credit: Emma’s impeccable swishing
skills and the farming teacher showing us how to not suck and throw half the
rice on the ground
Cooking
Well, I think you mostly know about this bit, but you put it
in water and simmer for, like 20 minutes. Then add some of that goat from
before, a bit of salt, and a lot of red chilli (if you’re Thai), and serve with
a fine Chang beer.
This was a lot of work, so have two. You deserve it.
Credit: A very thirsty J and Nok's encouragement of my bad habits (our tour guide)
Credit: A Thai-sized apron on
a very-not-Thai-sized person
